


Painting Paradise

by Scrunyuns



Category: The Terror (TV 2018)
Genre: Angst, FaPwP: fluff and porn without plot, Fair Warning: this fic goes from scary to sad to horny and then back to sad again in record time, Fluff, Frottage, I wanted this to NOT be a horny story but it kinda just turned out like that, M/M, Nightmares, Pillow Talk, Soft Hickey... kinda, Sol has a praise kink? (unintentional on my part, Spooning, Trauma, UST that quickly becomes RST, and he likes dirty talk, apparently he is also into the idea of outdoor fucking, guess I’m just a Horny Fuck at heart. can’t stop won’t stop, handjobs, hurt/comfort I guess??, it just happened), snuggles, solomon is one touch-starved bitch lemme tell ya!, some gore and vague references to cannibalism uwu, sorry @ God & Mom, sub!Tozer/dom!Hickey
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-14
Updated: 2019-02-14
Packaged: 2019-10-26 13:58:50
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,155
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17747183
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Scrunyuns/pseuds/Scrunyuns
Summary: The ghosts of his dead crewmates seek him out in the night, in his dreams, turning them into nightmares.Hickey seeks him out when he wakes.





	Painting Paradise

**Author's Note:**

  * For [littledozerbaby](https://archiveofourown.org/users/littledozerbaby/gifts).



> Wrote this as part of a fanworks exchange, for the extremely talented littledozerbaby. Hope you like this Valentine’s Day gift, kiddo :-)

“Sergeant.”

A voice calls out in the dark, raspy and hollow, making Solomon Tozer bolt up in his cot. He scrambles for his rifle; it’s loaded and ready to go. It always is, these days.

Can’t be too careful out here.

“Who goes there?”

The sergeant tries to keep his voice calm, but he can hear it cracking under the weight of his own terror, unsteady as the trembling hands on his gun.

A large figure appears, illuminated by the light of the oil lamp: a man, nearly naked, stumbling towards him. He appears to be injured.

His fingers are twisted at unnatural angles, and when Tozer looks closer he can see that they’ve been crushed by what must have been a terrible weight. He can see scorched and blistered skin, and singed hairs on the sides of the man’s head. There are still remnants of clothes clinging to his body, mostly burned away.

Some of the hair and fabric is still burning. It fills the air with a noxious stench that makes Tozer’s eyes water and turns his stomach. And as the stranger comes further into the light, the sergeant can now see the horrific state that his head is in: The skull is cracked wide open, leaving the brains on full display. 

It is then that the sergeant recognizes him.

”Dear God...”

The man stops and drops to his knees. Discarding his weapon, Tozer rushes to his comrade’s aid.

“Who did this to you, Heather?”

His efforts of trying to keep the private upright is a welcome distraction from the tears that are starting to well up in his eyes.

“You did...” comes the slow, mumbled response.

“Me?”

“You left me there, Sol. Why didn’t you… help…”

Private Heather trails off as he lets his eyes fall closed and his head hang limp, as if to sleep.

“I tried to save you,” Tozer says, his voice cracking again. “I tried, I tried, I swear it.”

The sergeant repeats it over and over, hoping that the words will somehow save his friend. But they soon turn into nothing more than a string of pitiful, wet sobs.

The air is getting hot; it’s like a sauna in that tent now. Tozer can smell the burnt canvas in the air, the roasting flesh. Heather’s body is piping hot. His burned skin starts to ripple and warp, bubbling up like pork crackling. It’s as if he’s being cooked from the inside out.

The sergeant can’t speak, he can barely even breathe.

His dying comrade’s head, limp as a noodle, lols against Tozer’s shoulder. The exposed brains soon liquify in the intense heat and they start to seep out, a nasty pink sludge spilling onto Tozer’s underclothes.

The sergeant panics.

In a vain, desperate attempt to save his fellow marine, he uses his hands to try and scoop the slimy remains of Heather’s brain back into his skull.

“No, no, no,” he begs, “please don’t go, not again-“

Suddenly Private Heather’s body starts to wither. He sinks together like a grotesque, collapsed sand castle; first turning to dirt, then to cinders. As he crumbles away between the sergeant’s fingers, Tozer can no longer do anything but simply look on in horror. And when a gust of wind sweeps through the sergeant’s tent, the ashes that once were Private Heather go with it.

Once again, the air has an icy chill. Once again, Sergeant Tozer is alone.

But no, there is something behind him now. He can sense it, its rancid odor hanging thick as mist in the air. And soon he can hear its footsteps; it’s large, and it is making its way toward him. Tozer doesn’t dare turn back to see what it can be.

He has some idea, though.

The sergeant freezes up when he feels the creature’s breath on the back of his neck, heavy and warm and putrid.

_Do not move._

_Do not make a sound._

Just as a monstrous roar tears through the air, impossibly loud, Tozer wakes. He wakes in a cold sweat, shivering as sobs spill from his mouth.

His mind is far too foggy with sleep and terror to register right away that he has come undone; even if he had been aware, even if all the men had gathered around to watch the sad spectacle, to mock him for his weakness, he would not have made an attempt to stifle his sobs. They are far and away beyond façades now, all of them; on many an occasion he has been woken by the heartbreaking sounds of one of his crewmates weeping in the night.

These days it’s more of the rule than the exception, really. These days, the absence of nighttime weeping would be an alarm bell.

When the last of his tears have fallen, Tozer sits up on his cot and wipes his face with his sleeve. It’s dark as the grave in his tent - his oil lamp must have burned out during the night. _There goes the last of our oil._

The sergeant is almost relieved; after everything, the cold and the darkness now scares him far less than flames do.

The sun isn’t up yet, but it is not quite pitch black out there; through the gaps in his tent he can glimpse a grey sky. He blinks in the dim light, trying to make sense of his surroundings. When his eyes finally adjust, Tozer finds - much to his horror - that they are still stuck here in this terrible wasteland.

Over these past few days, he has been forced every morning to take stock of what are dreams and what are not. And every time he is horrified to find that the worst of his memories were indeed real; Heather was trampled to death in the fire. He had witnessed Mr. Collins’ encounter with the beast, his soul being consumed. And now they have eaten Gibson.

_Lord help us all._

The sergeant cringes at the memory. He recalls hating himself in that moment, for the feeling of relief and gratitude that had washed over him as he swallowed down the first piece of Gibson’s flesh, finally filling his empty, wailing stomach.

Yes, he had been hungry. But he’s sure that the bear must have been hungry, too, when it ate Mr. Collins.

_Am I no more than a wicked beast?_

It all seems very much like a nightmare, but this is his reality now.

The flap of his tent is suddenly flung back. There, against the dim light of early dawn, appears the unmistakable silhouette of Cornelius Hickey. It’s an arresting sight. The little troublemaker looks almost taller these days, even in that massive officer’s coat that practically swallows him up. Perhaps it’s _because_ of the coat.

“Everything alright, Solomon?”

The sergeant gives a curt nod and turns away from the light, should there still be tears lingering on his cheeks. Weakness has no place here in the Arctic, that much is now abundantly clear.

“You were crying out,” Hickey says, still unconvinced.

“Nightmares,” Tozer admits. This is all that he’s willing to say on the matter - for now, at least. “Is it time to roll out?”

“The sun’s not quite up yet,” Hickey says. “Not as though that should tell you much of anything, really. Not in this upside-down place.”

“Are the men up?”

Hickey shakes his head.

“Still abed.”

“Good,” Tozer says. “They’ll need all the rest they can get for this next haul. I shall not rouse them until I have to.”

Hickey nods, albeit grudgingly. Everything in his body language practically screams with impatience. This is a man who wants to get somewhere, and _fast_. Sergeant Tozer does too, make no mistake - he wants to get out of this wretched place, to put as many miles as he possibly can between himself and the devil on their tails - but nowadays he is no longer so sure that Hickey means to head in the same direction as he does.

“When did you wake, then?” Tozer asks.

The little man only offers a shrug for an answer, and that enigmatic smirk of his is there once again. It seems Cornelius Hickey will keep even the smallest, most insignificant of matters close to his chest. Tozer tries not to be insulted by the evident lack of trust.

The sergeant has to wonder, as he often does, if the man ever even sleeps at all.

“These nightmares…” Hickey starts, scratching his forehead as he steps out of the dim light and into the sergeant’s dark little corner, taking a seat next to him on his cot. “Will you tell me about them?”

There had once been a time when the sergeant would not have allowed any of this - the proximity, the familiarity, the probing questions. Just a couple of weeks ago he would have told Hickey to piss right off and mind his own business. But like so many things in his life, their relationship has taken a turn of late.

Much like the arctic ice, their standing with each other has shifted. They’ve been pushed together by the unstoppable force of their predicament, and now Tozer welcomes him. More than that, he finds himself appreciating the intimacy that he now shares with Hickey -  _yearning_ for it, even.

And even as he struggles to shake the ever-growing feeling of dread - images of an officer’s coat with a series of knife cuts to its lapels, the memory of just how light Billy Gibson’s limp body had felt as he had helped carry him over to the slab - Tozer still clings to Hickey, seeking out his approval, his attention. His guidance, more than anything.

Hickey’s eyes search the sergeant’s face, and his expression is oddly sincere.

“What plagues you, Solomon?”

The words are a kindness, his tone soft and sweet and patient. Tozer normally knows better than to wear his heart on his sleeve, but it has all just been far too much lately; he needs somebody to dump all his worries onto. And Hickey, it seems, is ready and willing to take that load off his shoulders.

“It’s Heather,” Tozer sighs. “And Collins. And Gibson. They find me in the night.”

Hickey is like a pillar of salt, his only reaction a furrowed brow.

“Do you not… is it not the same for you?” the sergeant asks.

He holds his breath as he searches Hickey’s eyes and waits for his response, although he isn’t entirely sure what kind of answer he is hoping for.

“Yes,” the little man finally says, tilting his head to the side in contemplation. “But they belong in the realm of dreams now, don’t they?”

Tozer nods, worrying his lip.

“Let them stay there,” Hickey adds, his hand coming to rest at the back of Tozer’s neck. “It’s time to look forward now, Solomon. Not behind us. Yes?”

The sergeant tries to find solace in that, but it’s still tough. When he tries to speak, his voice cracks once again.

“Gibson, he… I can still feel him in my stomach, Cornelius.”

“Of course you can,” Hickey says. “So can I.”

The little man holds his gaze, keeps Tozer’s eyes transfixed on his own, as he reaches out to lay a warm palm against the sergeant’s stomach.

“But that is just the absence of hunger that you’re feeling, Solomon. Nothing more.”

“No, not only that,” Tozer objects. “I feel like I’ve… consumed more than just his flesh. I feel _wrong_ , Cornelius.”

Hickey seems puzzled by this, his head once more cocked to the side.

“Do you not feel the same?” Tozer asks again.

This time his voice is more insistent, his despair fully bared now. He looks Hickey in the eye, silently pleading, searching for some semblance of understanding.

The little man caves, finally letting his steadfast gaze wither.

“Well…” he sighs. "We’re only human, though, are we not?”

His eyes find Tozer’s again, and his thumb starts softly stroking the skin underneath the sergeant’s shirt.

The touch leaves Tozer breathless.

Only a month ago, the idea that he’d one day would be sitting here, neck deep in mutiny, paralyzed by fear and doubt, taking both orders and solace from somebody like Cornelius Hickey - even accepting words and gestures of affection from the man, and _cherishing_ it too boot - it would have sounded absolutely preposterous to him.

But so much is different now. He is not the man he used to be, and the world around him has also changed; Tozer has seen things too terrible and too mad explain. He has seen the beast. And he has seen it feasting on a man’s soul, seen Collins’ very essence being ripped from his body as though it were just another piece of flesh. Here in this moment, it would seem that most anything is possible - even an alliance with Cornelius Hickey.

In this moment, Hickey’s skin against his own is not unwelcome; it is a beacon in the night.

“We will get out the other end of this, Solomon.” Hickey’s voice is firm, and he offers a reassuring, confident smile to go with it. “We’ll get out, and when we do… it’ll be just you and me, resting our weary heads on white sands.”

His words are as sweet and tender as a lover’s kiss, and Tozer cannot help but hang onto every single one.

“Endless ivory shores,” Hickey says, his voice soft and dreamy as he reaches up to tuck a stray lock of curly hair behind Tozer’s ear. “Ripe, juicy fruits on our lips. The sun warming our skin… no more of this. No more pain. No more of this frozen hell.”

There’s an odd, ill feeling settling in Tozer’s gut; something telling him that this is not the first time Hickey has uttered these words, or at least some version of it. Some part of him seems to know, intuitively, that Hickey might only be saying this because it’s exactly what Tozer wants - and needs - to hear. He tries to shake it from his mind.

Perhaps it is Hickey himself who needs those words. Somehow that potentiality is a thousand times worse.

“Get some more rest now,” Hickey says.

His hand slips down from Tozer’s neck as he stands up to leave, but the sergeant catches him by the cuff of his sleeve.

“Stay. Please.”

Looking up at Hickey, pleading with him, Tozer knows he must be looking rather pathetic. But he is past the point of caring for his own pride; right now he only wants one thing in this world, and that is Hickey’s warm body against his. He needs him there, to ward off the demons. Even if it’s only for a little while.

Hickey, for his part, looks unsure. But the perplexed wariness that informs his expression soon fades, and he sits back down.

Tozer does not let go of his sleeve.

Their newly-appointed leader has got a certain look on his face now, a puzzled, intrigued and expectant expression, as if he’s waiting for Tozer to explain himself. And at the same time, he seems as though he’s about to say something - but instead, to the sergeant’s surprise, Hickey remains quiet and instead brings a hand up to Tozer’s head.

Delicate fingers run gently through brown, messy curls. Sergeant Tozer holds his breath as Hickey’s hand comes to rest on his cheek.

Then Hickey asks, barely above a whisper:

“Do you need me, Solomon?”

The sergeant breaks.

“Yes,” he says, breathless and enraptured.

The smile that forms on Hickey’s face is something that is surely meant to seem benign and reassuring, but there is a certain unsettling element that shines through in his eyes: satisfaction. Triumph.

Tozer tries not to let it worry him.

He allows Hickey to guide him back down onto his cot, turning him on his side, and for a brief moment Tozer is left wondering if he’s is intending to have his way with him. But instead, Hickey simply holds him.

“Might this help you sleep better?” he murmurs into the sergeant’s ear. His free hand makes its way back to the shaggy mop of Tozer’s hair. “Will it help if I stay here with you, like this?”

The hot breath on the back of his neck and the sensation of those deft fingers playing with his hair, it both soothes and excites him. It is the strangest feeling; this is the most safe he has felt in weeks, and yet his heart is racing like a jackrabbit’s.

To his shame, Tozer starts to grow hard.

“You know, I used to think that you were a fool,” Hickey starts, his voice soft and sweet as ever. “Just another… big, brash, barely sentient meat puppet for command to put between themselves and a hailstorm of lead, should they have the need. But you’re different, Solomon. Quite different.”

Those words are intoxicating enough in of themselves, and when Hickey starts to nuzzle his neck, Tozer forgets how to breathe altogether. What’s more, he can now feel something hard at the small of his back: unless this is just his overactive, hopeful imagination playing tricks on him, it seems that Hickey is as excited as he is.

“You were clever enough to make the right choice,” Hickey continues, his lips brushing against the shell of Tozer’s ear. “And you’re strong enough to stick with it, even in this bleak hour. Now, that takes an enormous amount of courage. I admire that. I hope you know this, Solomon.”

Tozer doesn’t know how much more of this torture he can take. Spurred on by the onslaught of praise, he decides to show that little silvertongue just how courageous he can be; he breaks free from the embrace and grabs Hickey by the wrist.

The caulker’s mate lets out a soft gasp when Tozer guides those nimble little fingers down to the front of his trousers.

“Quite forward, aren’t you?”

Hickey sounds more amused than shocked - and rather than pulling away, he leans into it, letting his hand rove over the sergeant’s length.

“My God...” he purrs. “Will I even be able to get my hand around that beast?”

“Why don’t you try,” Tozer quips back.

Hickey doesn’t seem to have anything clever to say to that, but Tozer can practically _hear_  the smarmy grin as Hickey starts to undo the buttons on the sergeant’s fly. His fingers make quick work of it, so quick and smooth that it invokes images of Hickey’s past; a lifetime of pickpocketing, no doubt. That, or whoring. Perhaps both.

A soft, warm hand slips inside, and the sergeant can’t stifle his moan.

“How’s that?” Hickey asks. “Nice?”

“Yes.”

‘Nice’ is an understatement - it feels incredible, even if Hickey isn’t yet stroking him. The little shit is taking his sweet time, letting his hand simply rest on top of the sergeant’s aching cock. Tozer soon finds himself moving his hips, desperately trying to find some form of friction.

“How long has it been since someone touched you like this, sergeant?” Hickey whispers in his ear. “You’re needy as a virgin.”

_It’s been too long, far too long._

“If you must know,” Tozer starts, trying to keep his voice steady, “I haven’t been with anyone since we left port.”

Hickey sucks in a quick breath, as if Tozer had just stomped on his toes.

“Oh, that is rough,” he says, his tone not entirely without mirth. “Small wonder you’re quivering like a leaf under my hand.”

“Just get on with it,” Tozer growls.

The sergeant has had enough of the teasing and toying, enough of the mocking words. He needs release.

Hickey answers the call.

“To think that we’d find ourselves here like this, eh?” His hand finally wraps around Tozer’s cock and starts slowly pumping. “To think I’d have you in the palm of my hand like this, at my mercy.”

“Is that how you see it?”

Tozer tries to keep his voice steady. He knows it’s true, but he still has enough self respect left to dispute it - he is a Royal Marine, after all - even as he is being tormented by skillful fingers. Even as Hickey _literally_ has him in the palm of his hand.

“Well,” says Hickey, “that is how it would seem.”

He doesn’t laugh when he says it, but the smug satisfaction is still evident in his voice.

The little bastard is right; he could release Tozer’s cock right now, leave him him there aching and unsatisfied, and the sergeant would fall to his knees and beg him to finish what he started. And so, Tozer does not try to further push his luck. He does what every good serviceman would do: he keeps his mouth shut.

And Hickey rewards him for it.

“I could really see you and me on a beach in the Pacific, you know.” He starts working faster on Tozer’s sensitive cock as he grinds his own erection against his arse. “I’d like to see how you’d look in the sun. Your skin all sunkissed, your hair fluffed up after a tumble in the waves… I reckon you’d be like a demigod of the ancient Greek myths.”

Tozer wants to scoff at those fanciful words, but when Hickey puts his mouth on the sensitive area where his neck meets his shoulder, the sergeant can’t help but shiver with pleasure. The indignant scoff that may have been instantly dies on his lips.

“Would you like to have me there, Sol? In between the dunes? There’d be not a soul around for miles… no one to sneer and pass judgement on us.”

When Hickey notices how Tozer’s breath hitches, he is spurred on. His hand picks up yet more speed. And with his carefully chosen words, he keeps on painting that pretty picture of paradise.

“I could cry out your name as loud as I please, and you mine,” he says. “No one would hear. No one would care. Not even God himself. There we’d be too far from his domain.”

Now Tozer can’t help himself; he starts thrusting himself into Hickey’s hand. The fantasy of fucking under a palm tree in a tropical paradise excites him beyond belief. For as many sexual encounters he’s had on land, none of them had been outdoors. Never under the open sky. Some part of him must have been worried that God was watching him.

“We could be as naked as newborn babes,” Hickey continues, in between his gentle kissing and biting at the skin of Tozer’s neck. “We could be as lustful as all the whores of Babylon, you and I, and no one would have a damned thing to say about it.”

Tozer is dangerously close, driven to near madness by Hickey’s skilled hands and sweet mouth. His body is taut as a bowstring.

“You could fuck me anytime, any way, anywhere you please,” Hickey whispers in his ear. “Would you like that, Solomon?”

“Yes.”

He tightens his grip on Tozer’s hair.

“Then you keep doing as I say. Always.”

Tozer’s body shudders as he peaks, and the power of it makes him lose control of his tongue.

“Yes, Cornelius,” he groans, clutching the sleeve of Hickey’s shirt. “I’ll do anything you ask…”

“Good boy.”

The sergeant finally finds release, his body jerking and his cock spilling its thick seed into Hickey’s palm.

His climax, while powerful, only lasts seconds. Tozer is glad for it. If it were to go on much longer, he might’ve started blurting out embarrassing declarations of love. And it’s wouldn’t be too far from the truth, either; in this moment, he is sated and dazed, and altogether far too happy for his own good. He is thoroughly blissed out, and he reckons he could get used to the feeling.

He thinks he could easily fall asleep like this every night, safely nestled in Cornelius Hickey’s arms.

But when the weight beside him on his cot shifts the illusion shatters, and now Sergeant Tozer  is wide awake. Hickey rises, taking with him all the warmth and comfort that he’d just provided.

“Enough lying about,” the little king declares. “It’s time to rouse the men.”

His voice is now completely different to the one that had just been whispering dirty, wonderful things into Tozer’s ear; it’s darker, harder, and saturated with ambitious intent.

The sergeant turns on his side and looks him square in the eye, in the hope that Hickey will balk and come back to bed, even just for a few more minutes.

No such luck.

“It’s _time_ , Solomon.”

Hickey’s words are pointed, firm, and final. He spares not another glance at Tozer as he opens the flap to the tent and allows in the gruesome, cold light of daybreak. Away goes Cornelius Hickey’s warm body, and with it go the ivory shores. With it go all the sweet fruits of paradise.

What remains is the vast and barren landscape of uncertainty.

**Author's Note:**

> (please lemme know if there are any typos that u might’ve caught, and I will fix that toute de suite!)


End file.
